Key Lime Pie

She zested the lime, throwing angry looks at her husband sitting on the couch with his feet hanging off the edge, mindlessly scrolling through Instagram- most likely double tapping some images of teeth or people doing yoga. He sat there oblivious to her irritable huffing and puffing over the egg yolk mixture that she knocks the lime zest into. 

“Will you get me the pie base from the fridge, Vinoda,” she yells from the kitchen. He doesn’t even bother to look away from his phone, before responding with a “But I just sat!”- a blatant lie. He begins to shift his weight around on the couch, but waits for her to tell him that it’s okay and she didn’t need his help. 

“Fiiiiine,” she yells back and makes her way to the refrigerator to retrieve the pie tin lined with the biscuit-butter base she left in the fridge an hour ago. She knocks it onto the counter, a little extra loud so Vinod would hear, but he didn’t bat an eyelid. Her mum always told her, “You need a million assistants to help you cook, Neha.” She wasn’t wrong but today Neha could really do with some help. 

She used half her attention to correct an error that her designer seems to have made on an upcoming post and the other half to transfer the pie mixture onto the base. This part is usually especially therapeutic, with the thick silky mixture creating waves before flattening out onto the pie base. But today, Neha wasn’t in the mood to appreciate any of that. She wasn’t even going to take a picture to post onto her Instagram today. 

“Vinoda, can you help me plug the oven in?” she yelled as she went to the other end of the kitchen to chuck the can of condensed milk into the trash and grab a cloth to wipe off the mess she’d made on the counter. She has always been a messy cook, and the ants in the building love her for that. Not today, ants and the infrequent cockroach- she gets to wiping the slab, still waiting for Vinod to come in and retrieve the oven from its stored spot to get on with baking the pie. 

“Vinodaaaa,” she calls out to him again, and she’s sure to add that hint of a tone that suggests her annoyance. It worked. He walks into the kitchen, careful to avoid eye contact, and places the oven on the counter, then plugs it in. Without another word, he rushes back outside and plops himself back onto the couch. 

She shoots an angry look in his direction but he remains oblivious to her wrath, seemingly absorbed in whatever is on his phone. She gets distracted by an incoming call, melting away her frustration at Vinod and redirecting her frustration towards whoever was on the other end of the call. Poor thing, her designer.

After the call and after the oven had warmed up a bit, she proceeded to place the pie tray in, setting the timer and banging the oven door (again, a little extra loud for drama) before returning to her laptop in the living room, avoiding any and all eye contact with her husband who doesn’t seem to have moved an inch. 

This was her favourite time when it came to baking. Those 18 minutes as the pie baked and the aromas of whatever sweet treat she was making wafted into the rest of the house- those 18 minutes always had an indescribable effect on Neha’s mood. 

She got to typing and got so involved in what she’s doing, that when the oven bell sounded 17 and a half minutes later, it startled her to a jump. Vinod casts a shooting glance in her direction and she in his, and they chuckle. 

She gets the pie out of the oven and leaves it out to cool before piping out the whipped cream. Just as she pipes out the last spiral, she receives another call from her designer at work. Her colleague is clearly surprised at the change of disposition from 20 minutes earlier. Neha is now explaining, rather sweetly, what she wants and how to correct the mistakes. On hanging up the call, she looks at Vinod smiling then proceeds to stick her tongue out at him, understanding why he forced her to make a key lime pie that day.